


Birth

by yeaka



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-07
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2019-01-30 20:55:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12661245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yeaka/pseuds/yeaka
Summary: Aiwendil always knew which being was for him.





	Birth

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Solarfox123](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solarfox123/gifts).



> A/N: This is a gift for auniverseforgotten, who donated to WECAN (a women’s environmental organization) for my [karma commissions drive](http://yeaka.tumblr.com/post/167176922380/karma-commissions) and requested “Gandalf/Radagast with mutual pining but a happy ending”.
> 
> Disclaimer: I don’t own The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, or any of their contents, and I’m not making any money off this.

He’s born anew when his body forms, one of sinew and bone with weight and texture—he falls, solid, to the earth, and walks upon it on two legs. They wobble at first, his hands reaching from one smooth trunk to the next, and he learns. Yavanna giggles, her laughter twinkling through the forest like the song of many birds. Aiwendil’s always _loved_ birds. He won’t fly with them again, she says, not while he wears this skin, but she promises it will be worth it for _other things_. So Aiwendil consents to this new shell. He’s never defied her before, and he won’t now.

She’ll teach him, she promises. She drifts across the lush underbrush, and Aiwendil follows, stumbling like a heavy boar. She coaxes him forward still, and he goes, follows, comes into her arms at the edge of a new clearing. She wraps her warm arms around him and kisses his forehead—it tickles his hair. She runs her long fingers back through it—its short and stubbly, like little fawns just freed of the womb. But it’ll grow, she tells him, vivid and thickly waved, like the firstborn that just now populate their world. He knows so little of them. He knows so little of _everything_. Everything was different in the formless state he once possessed, and now he has to learn it all again. She soothes him and says it’s for the best.

He follows her through most things, as all the Maiar do their Valar, and he thinks he has the best of them—Yavanna is kind, beautiful, and _green_. The flowers grow wherever she walks, blossoming into new shapes and colours, and all the creatures of their world love her. Aiwendil can’t _exist_ alongside these strange creatures as he once did, but he’s like them now. He sees the world as they do, hears it, smells it, feels the same squish of the dew-slicked grass beneath his feet. The first time he holds a rabbit in his arms, he cries. 

Yavanna wipes his tears away and kisses his cheek. He strokes the rabbit until its mate comes to call for it, and then she makes him set it down again, and it runs off to be with its own kind. Aiwendil watches it with a wistful sort of awe. From his new perspective, down atop the rugged ground itself, everything seems wonderful. 

But he has things to do. He’s a servant still, her servant, and he tries to listen. He follows her about, heeding her song, attending to her whims, and watching with wide eyes as she helps their world grow ever greater. She has many things to teach him, and he _tries_ to learn.

But then a wild stag will leap between them, and Aiwendil will be lost in its graceful curves, or he’ll find himself wandering off, tailing a twittering squirrel, that scurries across the forest floor and up into the leaves before his hands can reach it. He spins below the branch it perches on, just watching it _be_ , until he realizes he’s gone and gotten himself lost. Not for the first time. Whenever he wanders back, sheepish and sorry, she pats his head and laughs. He _really_ tries to learn.

He wanders back now, face turned to the sky in the hopes of catching her music on the wind, or perhaps the faint scent of her floral gown. He totters about, first this way, then that, until he hears a branch snap behind him, and he whirls around to meet a new creature amidst the ferns.

Tall and handsome, an Elven figure steps out before him. Aiwendil halts in place—this is no elf; he would know. It’s another _Maiar_ , just like him: he can _sense_ it, feel the fervent power trapped beneath cream-coloured skin. The being is a man, like Aiwendil, with a swath of white hair twisting down his shoulder, sharp, blue-grey eyes that seem to change in the flickering light. His silver robes are thin and plain, but the golden embroidery around the top is reminiscent of a Vala. It takes Aiwendil a moment to place the design, and then he breathes, “Manwë?”

“Olórin,” the creature answers, one hand extending forward. It’s the way the firstborn greet—Aiwendil’s seen it from a distance, when they stray from their villages to wander through his woods. Aiwendil reaches forward to clasp the offered hand, and the sheer _touch_ of warm skin on skin makes him shiver. It’s the first time he’s touched anyone save Yavanna, and it couldn’t be more poignant.

Olórin looks at him questioningly, and Aiwendil belatedly explains, “I am Aiwendil.” A soft smile flitters across Olórin’s lips. Aiwendil adds: “I am of Yavanna.”

Olórin doesn’t return the title, but he doesn’t have to: his visage is obvious. He strikes Aiwendil as the kind of regal, wise ruler that only _could_ be from Manwë’s court. Not that he has much dealings with any of the other Valar or Maiar. This one he seems to _know_.

He has nothing else to say, but he finds himself smiling at Olórin anyway, letting that be enough. Olórin smells faintly of cedar and pine, two things that Aiwendil already likes. Then a bird stirs above them, drawing both their eyes, as its ocean-blue wings spread and flap against its sides. It lets out a sweet call before leaping off its branch, and it spirals down in lazy circles to perch on Olórin’s shoulder. Olórin laughs and reaches up to scratch beneath its beak. Aiwendil’s breath hitches. He’s drawn to the scene with an eerie, gut-wrenching force that couldn’t be explained. His hand lifts to mirror Olórin’s, petting the gorgeous creature, and it trills happily to both of them, drowning out all else. Aiwendil’s eyes are only for Olórin’s.

But a new song twists between the trees before anything more can be exchanged. Aiwendil turns towards it, and Olórin hums thoughtfully, “Your mistress is calling.” 

Aiwendil flushes. The experience is new—his cheeks tingle with heat and embarrassment. He offers Olórin a shy smile, and then he slips away. He chases Yavanna’s presence, and he tries not to look back.

He does only when he’s reached her, out amongst the rolling hills, with the forest far away and Olórin gone from sight. Yavanna cups his cheek and says he has _much_ to learn. He _must_ pay attention. Aiwendil nods in her gentle grasp and promises that he will. 

She tells him many things, not just then, but in long, sweeping moments spent amidst her garden. Each time he comes to her, she’ll paint a new picture with her words, and Aiwendil will try to hear them, rather than the far off twittering of birds or the faintest hint of cedar or pine on the wind. She tells him that he must be careful, for this life of his is a new one, and it is _life_ , not the endless existence he once knew. It comes with many things. His body has many needs. And she warns him that soon, when he’s only just settled into his new skin, the _heat_ will come.

This, Aiwendil faintly understands. Elves experience it, he assumes, but he knows it more from the animals—he’s seen them in need of one another, and he’s heard their torrid cries when such company isn’t met. He thinks he knows. So he doesn’t listen as much as he should.

Instead, he grows distracted with every stray creature that should wander across his path. And now he starts to actually wind down towards the village, near the base of the mountain where Manwë overlooks it all, and once or twice, he’ll spy Olórin across the distance. Olórin is always busy. He has many things to do, many ways to serve his master, and many still that come to him for aid. Aiwendil sometimes follows him about like a newborn puppy, one that Olórin will occasionally ordain to smile at, even pet behind the ears. Once, they sit at a wooden bench the elves have made, and they watch the tide come in and lick across the sand. Olórin tells him of other places far beyond the sea, and _this_ Aiwendil listens to, though more the rich timber of Olórin’s voice than the content. But then Manwë’s will is whispered to them, and Olórin’s swept away. Aiwendil wanders back to his mistress, chastised but without regret. He wants to see Olórin again.

He wants it most when his first heat comes. She warned him of it, but she isn’t there when he wakes. He comes to in the middle of his favourite enclave, his brown robes clinging wetly to his skin, and sweat beads across his brow like he’s run through the rolling waves. His body _burns_ like Aulë’s forge. He writhes in the broken grass and sobs as it blazes through him, merciless and all consuming. There is no relief. She told him there would be pain. But he never knew it. He’d never _hurt_ before. For one brief, fleeting moment, he curses her and all her kind—Eru Ilúvatar, even—for condemning him to this. But then he reels back and knows that he _must_ feel it. She told him that life needs contrast. He must know the bad if he’s to love the good. For once, he doesn’t think of birds. He spares no thought to the wildlife that runs from his fevered cries. 

All he thinks of is _Olórin_ , standing tall and bright in the middle of his fields, palm extended to Aiwendil. He thinks of running into Olórin’s arms, of feeling Olórin wrap around him, of breathing in Olórin’s raw scent and kissing his cheek, listening to the quiet rumble of his powerful voice. Aiwendil’s sure his racing heart would still under that command. He’s sure his body would obey—it would recede and settle and allow him _peace_.

But Olórin is nowhere near him, and Aiwendil’s too delirious to move. He can’t speak, he can’t think. He squirms on the hard earth and whines and whimpers. He lets the shudders wrack his frail body and the horrid urges cloud his mind. He doesn’t even know what they’re for. He yearns for _something_. Olórin? But he doesn’t even know what he’d do if he had Olórin with him, other than hold on tight. 

For a long, long time, the pain owns him. It ends only with the tantalizing whisper of unconsciousness, where blackness takes him.

And when he wakes again, sticky and spent on the forest floor, Aiwendil is _ashamed_. He remembers it all, every pathetic moment, and he’s never been so... _physical_. He’s never been so weak. He’s never surrendered so wholly to the petty wants of his body, and he feels ashamed to be called Maia. Maybe he shouldn’t be. Maybe there was some mistake, and he should be just an elf after all, one with no responsibility and no Vala to serve, only a vague allegiance to Manwë and all his Maiar. 

He’s most ashamed of how he thought of Olórin. When he totters up and out of the woods, down into Yavanna’s gardens, he collapses at her feet and lays his trembling head in her lap. He can’t bring himself to tell her whom he thought of. So he says nothing. She pets his hair and seems to understand. It’s grown longer now, but not nearly as long as Olórin’s. Not as straight and silken. Yavanna tells him that he need not be alone. She tried to warn him. He can feel pain with this body, but so can he feel pleasure. And many of the Maiar are like this now. There’s no shame in it, although shame is an Elven emotion—not one the Valar should concern themselves with at all. Aiwendil wonders what’s become of him. 

He apologizes for being gone as long as he was. He makes it up to her by attending her gardens with twice as much care. He doesn’t even leave for the friendly little hedgehog that trots in to watch him, although it’s dreadfully cute and he’d love to follow it away. It won’t tell him its name—or perhaps it does but he can no longer understand—so he gives it one of his own, and he calls goodbye when it leaves.

He tries harder now. He studiously follows Yavanna, and he drinks in all her words, and he learns what he lacked: a _partner_. Like all the animals that he’s ever seen fall into heat. There are heats, she says, and _ruts_ , and they should match. He must find the rut to his heat. Find his other half. All things are made in twos. There was a time, once, when _one_ was enough, but his body no longer remembers it, and he knows just what she means. At first, the information is only that: empty words, with which he can do nothing.

But as time moves, counted only by the elves, Aiwendil thinks he must do _something_. He can’t suffer again—she forbids him. She tells him to choose another, and if their makeup is complimentary to his own, they will be a balm to his wounds. Any Maiar would do this for him. Though none of the Maiar seem to really _understand_ him, and he knows quite a few that would scoff in his face.

Olórin wouldn’t. And one time, when they find one another by a bubbling stream, walking back towards the village of elves, Aiwendil dares to ask: “Which are you?”

“Alpha, as the elves call me,” Olórin answers, seeming to know just what Aiwendil means. And it’s good, because Aiwendil is omega. It makes him smile just to hear it, and they walk for a little while in silence, their bare toes dipping in and out of the flowing water. It’s cool against his warming skin—Olórin always makes him warm. When he slips on a rock, too busy in his idle daydreams to know where he’s going, Olórin reaches out to catch him. Olórin grips his arm and steadies him by it, chiding, “Careful.”

Aiwendil straightens and says: “Thank you.” And when they’re just within sight of the high, gleaming walls, Aiwendil speaks again. “Wait.”

Olórin does. He stills at Aiwendil’s side, head tilting curiously, cloud-white hair tumbling down one broad shoulder. Aiwendil sucks in _courage_ , because Yavanna says fear is unbecoming, and he knows in his heart that what he suggests is _right_. He tells Olórin, with a flush to his cheeks and a tremor in his voice, “I will reach heat soon.”

“I am sorry,” Olórin replies, now troubled. His slender grin slips into a frown, and Aiwendil almost balks at it—it seems so strange to see Olórin _sad_. “I know it is a difficult time...”

With no more thought, Aiwendil blurts, “Share it with me.” And Olórin blinks at him as though genuinely surprised, even though Aiwendil was so sure that Olórin knew everything.

Olórin doesn’t answer right away. The silence falls on the water lapping about their ankles and the distant cry of birds. Aiwendil waits with bated breath.

Then Olórin says, “No.”

Aiwendil’s whole world falls apart. He can feel it crumbling around him, dissolving below his toes and slipping back into the void. Olórin looks away, raking a hand back through his hair, and shakes his head. He murmurs, “It would not be fair. Your mind is not your own—”

“But it is,” Aiwendil insists, because he’s sure he’s wanted this for as long as he can remember.

Olórin sighs, “ _Aiwendil_ ,” and it instantly silences him. “That is simply the heat talking. You are not in control...”

“I _am_.”

“And besides, we are not our own to give.”

Aiwendil can feel a strange wetness prickling at the corners of his eyes. He remembers tasting salt on his cheeks when the heat took him last, and he’s seen elves cry. But most animals don’t. It feels odd, but the stinging in his eyes won’t go away. He mumbles, “Yavanna would wish me to...”

“Manwë would not approve.”

Aiwendil doesn’t understand why. Maybe Olórin’s too good for him—perhaps that’s it—there are wiser, stronger Maiar that mastered these forms in a single moment and still manage to slip back into their old consciousness just as quickly. Aiwendil is something of a fool, slow too learn, and he likes the birds better than the people. Manwë loves birds too, and he’d thought...

He whispers, “I am sorry,” and doesn’t pursue it. Olórin made his choice. Olórin reaches out to brush his nimble fingers along the back of Aiwendil’s clenched knuckles, but Aiwendil pulls his hand away. The touch is too alluring, and he doesn’t want to be seduced if it will all go unfulfilled. He turns from Olórin and wades back the way he came. 

When he’s only a few steps away, Olórin mutters, “It would bond us, you know.” Aiwendil glances back, and Olórin finishes: “Forever.”

Aiwendil knows. He wanted that. He wonders vainly how much Olórin thinks he _doesn’t_ know. How useless does Olórin find him? Olórin sighs, “There is still so much to do...”

Aiwendil nods like he understands. But he keeps moving, far and away, all the way back to Yavanna’s green splendor, where the towering trees hide his shame. He slips between them and lies down amidst the fallen leaves, ready to face his doom. He waits until the heat takes him, and he feels the agony twice as fiercely, because now he knows _rejection_ , and Olórin is still all he thinks of.

Yavanna comes to him, slipping inside his little grove while he’s too far gone to tell. She touches his burning forehead with her tender palm and asks him to choose another, but all he can do is cry Olórin’s name. When Yavanna rises, as though to fetch him, Aiwendil snatches her arm and begs her not to try. She smiles at him sadly. That’s the last clear thing he registers before the pain consumes him, and he knows no other coherent thoughts until the end of it, when he’s brittle and broken and sobbing against the earth. The grass is damp with his tears. A rabbit comes and curls in against his stomach, nuzzling into the robes he’s been senselessly clawing at. He strokes its soft fur and tells himself he has them—all of them—and they will be enough. 

They gather around him, deer, and squirrels, and even little mice that crawl out of their holes to comfort him. He lies with them until he can bear to stand, and then he totters off towards the garden, as clumsy as he was when he first received his legs. He’s like the water Maiar when they stumble up on land.

Yavanna isn’t there, then. She’s off in council, speaking of greater things than him. While he trims her rose bushes, he wonders what _ruts_ are like.

He wonders if Olórin ever thinks of him. Not even just in rut, but at all. He would soothe Olórin’s, if Olórin asked. But Olórin never would. Aiwendil accidentally shears off a blossom that he’d meant to cut around, and the distress eats up his mind.

But he’s better by the time she’s returned again. He’s settled. He _can_ be wise. Not enough for Olórin, but enough for himself. He and Yavanna work in silence to keep their lands as picturesque as they’ve always been. 

The time comes again to visit the elves, and Aiwendil does, listening more to the domestic animals that play about their feet than to the firstborn themselves. When he returns and can report only this, Yavanna smiles indulgently. Then she sends him on an errand to Eönwë, and he goes. 

Eönwë is like a dove. He’s perched beneath Manwë’s mountain, done all in white with golden hair, and he smiles sweetly at Aiwendil when he arrives. Eönwë is alpha, Aiwendil thinks, but probably manages his ruts much better than Aiwendil does his heats—it’s hard to think of Eönwë struggling with anything. 

If he did struggle, he could ask anyone to soothe him. Everyone loves him. The elves love him most of all. Perhaps even they can tend to a Maia in need, and perhaps that’s why Eönwë walks amongst them so often. Aiwendil thinks of asking, but the moment passes before he can. 

On the way down the hillside he sees Olórin coming. It occurs to him then that _Olórin_ could go to the elves. And it pains him to think that, because while he could never reach Eönwë’s greatness, surely he provide better than the firstborn, who are lovely, yes, but have never been more than their own flesh and blood.

He opens his mouth when they pass one another, and Olórin says first, “I am sorry. I have not been to visit your forest in some time.”

Whatever Aiwendil was gong to say, he swallows it down. He says only, “Please do,” and smiles. 

The smile Olórin gives in return is radiant, more beautiful than anything Aiwendil could dream. He wants to snatch it away and hold it always in his heart, to cradle it against his chest when all else seems lost. Olórin promises: “I will.”

And then he ducks his head and carries on, he to his Valar and Aiwendil to his. He returns to Yavanna humming happily, and she laughs for him, not pestering him with why. He thinks things will be better now.

They are, for a time. Olórin visits when he can, and Aiwendil often looks for him, always pleased to find him, always running to his side. They speak of little things, of personal things, and of the busy coming and goings of their beloved Valar. The first time Aiwendil sees Olórin pet a fawn, Aiwendil’s heart races twice as fast. 

When Olórin is away, Aiwendil walks with Yavanna. She still has more to teach him. He really tries to be good for her. But he finds his focus fading soon, and he always feels that he’s missing _something_. When Olórin is near him, the ache doesn’t seem so great. But when he’s alone, it swallows him, and he wonders many times if something’s _wrong_ with him. The body they gave him is broken. Yavanna sings to him to find his alpha, and he tries to listen, he really does.

He vows to plead his case. He thinks if he can only try again, perhaps farther from heat when his head is obviously clear, he can convince Olórin that he’s sincere. That he wants this. That surely Manwë wouldn’t deny him. The Valar made them all in pairs. It doesn’t matter that they serve different ones; it seems clear to him that they’re a match, and as scared and unworthy as he is, he knows that he must _try_. Yavanna makes him promise to. Then there’s no escaping it.

His third heat approaches, and before it comes, Aiwendil draws Olórin aside. They’re strolling down the streets of the Elven home—one that Aiwendil should know the name of but has never learned. Those things aren’t important to him. But it is a pretty place, with the paper lanterns lit about the walls and casting different coloured light across Olórin’s artful palette. Behind the tall branches of a potted tree, Aiwendil breathes, “I must speak to you.”

“And I you,” Olórin answers, his frown equally as deep. Aiwendil falters, worry stirring in him, and then Olórin sighs and says, “I am leaving.”

At first, Aiwendil doesn’t understand.

He thinks he’s heard wrong, and he waits for context to make the truth any clearer. But Olórin says no more, only looks at him imploringly, and Aiwendil has no words. Tears begin to bubble up again, though he isn’t sad, only numb.

He finally croaks out: “What?” His voice is hoarse, strained.

“I muse sail,” Olórin tells him, gentle as one would be with a wild horse. “Surely you know what has happened here of late, and Eönwë has looked for the firstborn across the water...”

Aiwendil didn’t know there were any there. He doesn’t know what’s happened _here_. He doesn’t know anything but animals and plants. Olórin reaches one hand up, and his thumb softly brushes away the tears that have fallen. He whispers: “I am sorry.” 

Aiwendil steps back, scrubbing at his own eyes, but more fall, faster than he can catch. Olórin hesitates, and Aiwendil wants so badly to just fly into him, to just _once_ be held in his strong arms. 

But they aren’t firstborn children. They don’t have such luxuries, and Aiwendil knows he should be far above such petty things as loss and tears. Olórin must do as he is told, and Aiwendil should expect no more. He tries to smile, be he knows it’s cracked and breaking.

Olórin looks at him for a long, long time. Neither move, and the world passes by around them, elves slipping past and the light changing under the drift of swirling clouds. Finally, Olórin turns to go.

Aiwendil had meant to speak his peace. But now there’s no point to it, and he holds his tongue. He watches Olórin become just a speck on the horizon, and then he turns and _runs_ , bolting all the way back to the lavender fields that surround Yavanna’s sunflower bed. He collapses there, spent and panting, not from anything physical but purely emotional. Yavanna comes to him.

He _begs_ her to go. He isn’t ready, he knows, and she tells him that, but he pleads anyway, even though this is all he’s ever known: the gorgeous gardens here and all the sweet animals that have become his friends. He’ll miss it all, but he _needs_ this, needs Olórin, and though he never speaks Olórin’s name to her, he’s sure Yavanna knows. Yavanna touches his heart and tells him that he was made to be a pair, and he can’t whither here alone.

She goes to speak with Manwë. Aiwendil stays where he stands, and again the world passes—Yavanna is gone for what seems a small eternity.

When she returns, he has her blessing. He’s given leave to sail, and a boat to go to, and he’s never felt anything so _wrong_ in all his life. He leaves the sand for the hard wood of the deck, and he wants to wail for the death of the trees and the lack of clean dirt beneath his toes. He can’t _feel_ the earth anymore. He’s distraught as the boat drifts away, Yavanna’s voice fading with the wind. The seagulls’ cries are harsh and high, but they’re the only things that soothe him. They, at least, wouldn’t steer him astray. He drifts to the rails to watch them, while the elves move all around him to keep their artificial craft afloat.

The journey across the sea is a long one. He fears most his heat, but it never comes, not once they’ve left the Undying Shores and drifted off into the sea. He wishes he’d been quicker, that _Yavanna_ had been quicker, so that he could’ve gone on Olórin’s ship. If he had Olórin by his side, the endless blue would be more bearable. Perhaps he could even enjoy the crisp air and the endless motion, if he only had Olórin’s warmth to lean against. But begrudging anyone is blasphemous, and he tries to banish the thought.

He spends most of the journey right there, without food or rest, though the elves offer both to him many times. He has eyes only for the birds. And eventually land becomes a sliver on the far horizon, and Aiwendil leans towards it, while the wind whips back his earth-toned hair. It was brown, once, deep and rich, but the strands that blow before him now seem lighter than before. She warned him of this. 

She said things _die_ here.

He disembarks anyway, while all the elves stay aboard. They sail away without a word to their brethren that already populate the shores. A lord of them comes to him, greeting him, offering him a feast and lodging, but Aiwendil brushes past them. He’s been amongst _people_ too long. And he came only for one thing.

The new world is vast. The light is different here, and _time_ is different: now the sun rises in the sky, sending dark shadows back from enormous trees, and then the moon comes out to chase it, and stars follow in its wake. Elves eagerly tell him all of this, of the legends of it, of the Maiar he might’ve once known, if he would’ve paid enough attention. But he didn’t, and he doesn’t concern himself with it. His troubles all walk upon the earth, and that’s where his gaze flows, from one land to another.

It isn’t only the firstborn, now. The second come, and then a third, and then a forth—people that are tall and broad and quick to die, ones that are short and stout but sturdy and strong, and then even little ones that live inside the hills. These Aiwendil likes the most, for they remind him of Yavanna. But when he looks at them, he misses her, and he strays from them just as surely. He strays from all of them, always searching, until his legs grow tired, and he needs a walking stick to make any of it possible.

His back bends. His hair grows, and new strands sprout along his chin. Once, he catches his reflection in a rumbling river, and it startles him back a step—he’s grown _old_. The only old things he ever knew where trees, but now he sees it on softened flesh, and it worries him deeply. He wants to ask Yavanna of it, but she’s no longer there.

No one is.

Animals are.

He gravitates to them again, like he always did. He works best in the densest forests, where the wildlife can live untroubled by Men and dwarves, and it’s there that he finally ceases wandering. There seems little point now, and there are even times, albeit few and far between, when he forgets why he ever came.

And then he’ll catch the white tuft of a furry tail or see a dove flutter by, and his heart will swell with memories. _Olórin_. Sometimes, he thinks he can _sense_ Olórin, not all that far from him, but too far away to reach out for. He runs first into Curumo. Curumo sneers and wonders why he came. Aiwendil keeps his council to himself and carries on, back into the woods where he belongs. 

There’s nothing for it. Eventually, he sets up his own little home, in a tidy shack like the firstborn used to make, humble and earthy and everything he is. The door is always open, the roof full of holes, so all his creature friends can swoop inside for shelter from the rain or a bite to eat. And every day Aiwendil goes out to walk about his woods, hoping that their paths will cross.

He doesn’t have heat again. It isn’t even until Olórin _finally_ finds him that he thinks of it. Aiwendil is standing by his stove, preparing tea like the little folk make, when footsteps come through his door. He looks up with widening eyes, and all the clouds seem to part around him. 

Olórin’s different now. _So_ different. But the same in all the ways that count—the same proud stance, the same strong presence, the same glittering eyes. His body is aged and wizened, his robes nondescript and grey. He wears a long, pointed hat, and his white beard is nearly as long as his hair. 

Aiwendil still breathes, “Olórin,” as his heart begins to mend. He’s shaking so hard that he doesn’t trust himself to lift the kettle when it whistles its completion. He wants to apologize, of all things, for waiting here, when he should’ve been out looking every day.

Olórin wanders in, as well he should, looking here and there at all the little knickknacks that Aiwendil’s carved out, and of course all the little beings with which he shares his home. A pair of thrushes has made a nice nest out of his highest cupboard, and a particularly fat hedgehog sits comfortably besides the dining table’s chair. Olórin smiles fondly at it—perhaps he sees that Aiwendil hasn’t changed all that much either. 

“There is much to do,” he mutters. His voice is different now, grated and rasped, but Aiwendil likes the sound of it just as surely. He pays no heed to all their age—it was still worth leaving the Undying Lands, if only for this moment. 

He tells Olórin, “I will help whenever I can.” Olórin nods like he thought as much. 

“Curumo leads us now,” he sighs, “though he will be called Saruman. I am Gandalf in their tongue, and a few others in others. And you...”

“Radagast,” Aiwendil answers, for that’s what the little people call him, and that’s good enough for him. Maybe it came with the elves, but he doesn’t care. 

Olórin nods again, accepting it, and repeats, “Radagast the Brown.”

Radagast tilts his head. He waits, but Olórin explains no more, at least, not that day, though he will in many to come, darting always in and out with scraps of information and harried news. This one day, where they meet again, Olórin asks, “Will you stay?”

Taking it to mean _right here_ , Aiwendil answers, “Yes. You will always find me here.” And he decides that he won’t move, not ever, even if all the green woods around him should rot and turn to ash. He won’t claw his way through this Middle Earth again, chasing down a great being that’s always just outside his grasp. 

He wants to ask _Olórin_ to stay, of course, and that’s when the thought of _heat_ first comes to him again. He’d wondered, once, if all the elves of this land are free of it, if it was a pain only for the land of pleasure. He hadn’t wondered of his own. Now the faint murmurs of it stir in him again, but he has no wish to burden Olórin with such things, not while Olórin looks so weary.

“Much, much to do,” Olórin repeats, his tongue clicking. Aiwendil gestures back into the depths of his ragged shack, not to take Olórin with him, but because Olórin clearly needs rest, like Aiwendil has had all this time. 

Olórin doesn’t stay long. Much too swiftly. He’s gone again in a heartbeat, off to great things and great adventures, ones that Aiwendil fears to touch. Olórin’s grown. He was always brave and true, but he seems more so now, and he laughs when Aiwendil tells him that. He confesses that he never thought himself ready for this world. But he is, and he excels at it, and Aiwendil is so very _proud_ of him. Aiwendil makes tea when he returns, and sits with him outside, beneath the stars and arching trees, their hands nearly brushing. It’s almost like old times. 

Except that when Olórin comes again, it’s been _far_ too long, and he’s grown truly _old_.

Aiwendil had though them old before. He thought the hairs beneath their chins living proof of decay, and a single line beneath the eyes a mark of times gone by. Now their faces are full of wrinkles, their hands drawn and tight, their beards streaked with grey. Aiwendil hasn’t seen the little folk in so long that he can no longer remember the difference between them and the other races—and sometimes he forgets even those. He forgets everything Yavanna ever taught him, except to love the land, and that they were made for _pairs_.

Even though they’re old, Aiwendil rushes to Olórin when he arrives. Aiwendil tosses his arms around Olórin’s neck, and Olórin ‘oof’s, tottering like he never did before. Aiwendil loves him still. Aiwendil’s _always_ loved him.

Aiwendil draws him by the hand to the little round table in the kitchen, where they sit and sip tea, and Aiwendil forgets all the _why_ s that used to hold him back. He’s too old now for all that nonsense. He no longer cares what a Maia should and should not feel; he only knows that if he has to go so long without seeing Olórin again, Yavanna will hear his cries halfway across their world. 

So he tells Olórin, as he wishes he’d done forever and a day ago, “I want to bond with you.”

Olórin chokes on his tea. Aiwendil can’t help laughing—he’s never seen Olórin so _un_ graceful. But Olórin quickly regains himself and starts, “Radagast...”

“Oh, will you or not?”

Like the first time Aiwendil ever asked, so long ago that he can barely recall, Olórin simply looks at him. It’s a long moment before Olórin insists, “I am much too old to deal with anyone’s heat, and you are much too old to have one.” Aiwendil opens his mouth, and Olórin presses on: “That was a concept from a world forgotten.”

“Not quite forgotten,” Aiwendil says, because _Olórin_ , at least, he’s always remembered. “And there are bonds in this world too, and I will take whatever you will give me. Whatever words you wish, from whatever culture you should like, I will take. And I would be happy if only you would stay with me for a little while.”

He reaches out as his heart yearns to, and he lays his hand atop Olórin’s, resting in the middle of the table. Olórin looks down at it, something sharp in his piercing eyes. 

It’s far too long before Olórin moves. When he does, he lifts Aiwendil’s hand up to his mouth. He brushes a kiss across the back of it, and even that one, light, innocent touch sends a shiver down Aiwendil’s expectant spine. Eyes uncharacteristically averted, Olórin admits, “I thought I would break you when we were young.”

Aiwendil starts, lost, and the confusion must be clear across his face, because Olórin sighs and explains: “You were always so... _free_. And carefree. And sweet and natural. And my ruts were so... brutish.” Olórin shakes his head, pain shadowed across his features. He squeezes Aiwendil’s hand in his as he murmurs, “I would have torn you apart like a bear on a flower, and I could not do that to you...”

Just in time, Aiwendil regains his breath, and he uses it to counter, “You would not have. You were noble, Olórin, you _are_ —you were strong and wise...”

“And _young_ ,” Olórin laughs, like the word is bitter now. Aiwendil doesn’t understand, until Olórin breathes, “I always wanted you, Radagast. But it would have been wrong to trap you to me, then, when we were new, and I could barely control myself. And now you have chosen a poor time to stir it up again, for now I have control, but my body is too _far_ from new, and I have more to do than ever.”

Aiwendil barely even hears the last part. All he hears is that Olórin _wanted him_ , the way he always wanted Olórin, the way he _knew they belonged together._ He repeats: “ _Just stay with me a while._ ”

Olórin opens his mouth, but the protest Aiwendil fears never comes. Olórin squeezes his hand. The fire ignites in Aiwendil again, and it doesn’t destroy him like it used to, but it makes him yearn all the same. 

He rises from the table, hoping for and delighted when Olórin follows suit. With their hands still tethered, he tugs Olórin back towards the bedroom, where they do no more than lie down together. The mattress has withered just as much as them, but even gaunt and hard, it serves them well enough. Aiwendil would’ve been perfectly happy to lie in the dirt with Olórin, back before he ever slept at all. 

They face one another. The touch one another—just little things, hands and cheeks and then their noses together, eventually their mouths. Their first kiss is light and fleeting, but it leaves Aiwendil feeling better than he ever has. It almost feels like old times. But _better_.

Amidst each little display of love, Aiwendil dares to ask, “Will you return there with me?”

He doesn’t have to say where. He doesn’t have to plead or make his case. Olórin promises, “Someday.”

And that’s good enough for Aiwendil. He’s waited long enough, and he’ll wait longer still. He just wants to be with Olórin for the rest of time, until the earth crumbles away and they leave their bodies again, two sets of consciousness still intertwined. Their story’s only just begun. 

And they bask in that together while all else fades around them, and only Olórin’s dizzying light is left inside his world.


End file.
